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Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Zevox

I have no problem with Goddess myself. Never had any particular difficulty with it, and the hack spots are nowhere near as exposed as on London, or the couple of bad ones on Hydra. Getting a hack mission in wave 6 or (especially) 10 on those is practically a death sentence if the team isn't willing to blow a bunch of missiles, even on silver.

The hack spots in Goddess are no better, and blowing missiles is nearly mandatory there as well, even on Wave 3 (Gold, anyway.) The one in the middle of the foyer is especially painful - there are no less than 4 exits down which enemies can run a train on your position, the Marauders/Nemesis/Rocket Troopers always seem to get the balcony overlooking your ring,

Originally Posted by Zevox

That "lovely sniper perch" in London though? Totally useless if you don't get a team smart enough to use it, which is extremely rare in my experience. Most people seem to like running around the vast open chunks of it, forcing me to do the same if I don't want to be sitting around bored waiting for them to either kill everything or die and leave me to face whatever they didn't kill alone. Needless to say, this makes the map that much more awful, even if I don't get a hack mission.

Zevox

Personally, I'd rather be slightly bored by a good team and get paid than top the charts because my squad sucks, but my only suggestion here is to play on Gold and you'll never be bored - there'll be more than enough bads for you to shoot at even without leaving the nook. And you have a commanding view of three spawn locations, including being able to zap kill targets with a rocket the instant they spawn if you're trying to hurry things along.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

No offense, but your team mates are stupid because they are playing on silver.

Seriously. Everyone who moves up to gold comments on how coordinated, friendly, cooperative and disciplined a gold team is compared to silver, ecause on silver you can run sound like an idiot and not sit 98% of the match out.

This is not to say silver players are stupid, or that gold players are smart. Just that the trends would naturally shift.

This. And the rewards are better. I never go back to Silver unless I'm leveling up, and even then I don't stay long. (~12 or so.)

Originally Posted by Avilan the Grey

I agree.

I think in retrospect the worst thing was to not realize the whole idea was bad. The fact that they (Bioware, not these two, directly) gambled on creating an ending that would cause controversy and discussion DELIBERATELY and then not knowing their own fans well enough, so they both misjudged both how strong that intended provoked reaction would get, and failed to realize in what way they would react... Especially in combination with the promises made in interviews and tweets.

The whole idea that believing that ending the game with "Lots of questions for everyone!" (directly taken from the final notes for writing the original ending) was a GOOD way to end the trilogy shows a number of people completely out of touch.

The idea was fine, they just bungled the execution etc. Not going to rehash this all over again.

Originally Posted by The Giant

But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Dhavaer

Yes. Like the Wraith, but higher fire rate, damage and weight, but lower accuracy. Alternately, like the Pirahna but 2 shot clip, faster RoF and much higher damage and weight. Best used on Destroyers and Infiltrators.

Edit: Forgot to mention it also has much higher recoil than each of those weapons. Not quite Crusader high, but still pretty crazy.

Bleh. Higher weight than the Wraith pretty much guarantees I won't be using it. Even my Krogan Vanguard gets 180% cooldown with a Wraith 1, and he has the shotgun weight decrease from his class talent.

Originally Posted by Aotrs Commander

So, apparently Bioware are talking about Mass Effect 4 and that it won't be about Shepard (no duh) or "Shepard 2" and won't even be about a soldier. Though they haven't even decided on the context, aside from it being "very, very different."

I am curious and wish to know more.

Originally Posted by Psyren

The hack spots in Goddess are no better, and blowing missiles is nearly mandatory there as well, even on Wave 3 (Gold, anyway.) The one in the middle of the foyer is especially painful - there are no less than 4 exits down which enemies can run a train on your position, the Marauders/Nemesis/Rocket Troopers always seem to get the balcony overlooking your ring,

No no, the hack spots in Goddess are far better, by simple virtue of Goddess having actual walls around. You can't get shot at by enemies (especially Ravagers) that spawned at the other end of the map like you can on London. Even the one in the middle you really only need to watch four areas - the hallway on the left, the balcony, the room to the right, and the hallway between the balcony and that room. A big improvement over London, where you can get swarmed from every friggin' direction.

Originally Posted by Psyren

Personally, I'd rather be slightly bored by a good team and get paid than top the charts because my squad sucks, but my only suggestion here is to play on Gold and you'll never be bored - there'll be more than enough bads for you to shoot at even without leaving the nook.

If I were inclined to deal with the higher difficulty of gold on a regular basis, I'd already be doing it. As-is I only go to gold when I want to speed up money gain, and even that doesn't always work since gold games have a much higher failure rate than silver ones.

But I can tell you right now that there's no way in hell I'd ever play a gold game on London. I'd drop out the moment I saw the map rather than do that. Even when my team is smart enough to stay in the raised walkway, playing on London is still by far the worst experience in the game for me.

Zevox

Toph Pony avatar by Dirtytabs. Thanks!

"When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up." -C.S. Lewis

"We each decide our own sense of right and wrong. The rest, I leave to my sword." - Yuri Lowell, Tales of Vesperia

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Sorry everyone, there are quite a few changes this week so they need a little bit more testing. We're hoping to get them out tomorrow morning. Below is a little preview of the changes.

- Some composition changes to Geth and Cerberus waves 9, 10, and Extraction on Bronze/Silver.
- Some Geth Hunter and Geth Prime nerfs across all difficulties.
- Some buffs to Drell and the original Turians.
- One of the more highly requested kits is being released...

I am so dearly hoping that the original turians get a roll, side-step or evasion of some kind.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Aotrs Commander

The military side was one of ME's stronger points, I think, and ditching that really doesn't sit well with me. (Plus, given DA2 to DA1, where they ditched the dubious "sanction" of being a grey warden for Some Dude Caught Up In Events - as far as I played, which itself speaks volumes of DA2 - does not exactly fill me with confidence.)

actually, had some stuff worth asking you about there.

There are some things in the game which belie my limited understanding. For one, officer Presley in ME1 seems to have gone from seaman to officer, having skipped most or all of NCO. I was always told that if you didn't go in as an officer you weren't going to be one (granted, my friends tend towards lazy "tell me who to shoot boss" kinda soldiers). Can you go from enlisted/NCO to officer? Just gotta get a degree, pass some tests, or?

Also, do you have any idea what the other alphanumeric categorizations are? N is special forces. what about the other 25? They stand in for MOS, so it's possible to find cognates there, but have only basic understanding of the attributes. And what does special forces consist of? Seriously? I've heard from fanboys who treat SF operatives like anime fans treat ninjas, I've heard from enlisted who treat them as arrogant jerks with a slightly tougher job, as arrogant jerks with a paradise for no reason, and as arrogant jerks who got the cool missions and training. I honestly cannot find a solid, distinguishing line that I can verify.

Gonna play Mass: the Effecting and would like some, You know, actual believable military structure.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by SiuiS

actually, had some stuff worth asking you about there.

There are some things in the game which belie my limited understanding. For one, officer Presley in ME1 seems to have gone from seaman to officer, having skipped most or all of NCO. I was always told that if you didn't go in as an officer you weren't going to be one (granted, my friends tend towards lazy "tell me who to shoot boss" kinda soldiers). Can you go from enlisted/NCO to officer? Just gotta get a degree, pass some tests, or?

Also, do you have any idea what the other alphanumeric categorizations are? N is special forces. what about the other 25? They stand in for MOS, so it's possible to find cognates there, but have only basic understanding of the attributes. And what does special forces consist of? Seriously? I've heard from fanboys who treat SF operatives like anime fans treat ninjas, I've heard from enlisted who treat them as arrogant jerks with a slightly tougher job, as arrogant jerks with a paradise for no reason, and as arrogant jerks who got the cool missions and training. I honestly cannot find a solid, distinguishing line that I can verify.

Gonna play Mass: the Effecting and would like some, You know, actual believable military structure.

As for the NCO to officer thing: it's possible, but it's very rare.

As for the special forces thing: My cousin (a marine) told me that sometimes during training you'll be taken aside and asked if you'd be OK with not seeing your family for 5 years. According to him, that sets off special forces training. The training is rigorous and the tests (physical and mental) tend to be incredibly demanding. As in "you'll wish you were dead," demanding. As far as I can tell, it takes a certain degree of extraordinary natural ability and uncommon devotion to one's nation to get into the special forces. My cousin also mentioned that most special forces guys tend to act very humble and low key, mostly out of the need to shield themselves with obscurity.

Avatar by The_Architect.

Originally Posted by Flickerdart

Fortunately, a Monk 1/Warblade 19 uses Iron Heart Surge to end the Monk character class, and the day is saved.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Zevox

No no, the hack spots in Goddess are far better, by simple virtue of Goddess having actual walls around.

I disagree, walls suck. Walls mean escape routes getting cut off, which means Banshee grabs, Phantom stabs, teammates unable to reach/revive you, less directions to run when a grenade lands in your hack zone etc. In London, sure you can be attacked from more directions, but you can also run in more directions and not get hemmed in/synched by something with a massive hitbox. And I don't remember all the hack zones in Goddess, but the ones I do are on lower ground, making it easy for grenades to end up in your pocket.

As for Ravagers - kill on sight. Don't wait until their friends are in your face and forcing you out of cover, pick them off from as far away as you can and ignore everything that isn't a Banshee until you do. Use everything short of a missile to do so - go all out. It should be cake to do so on Silver, and that's another reason I like wide open maps - you can see them coming a mile away and deal with them accordingly.

Anyway, which map is "better" likely comes down to playstyle. I hate Goddess because it doesn't suit my playstyle, you hate London because it doesn't suit yours. Neither of us is wrong.

Originally Posted by Zevox

If I were inclined to deal with the higher difficulty of gold on a regular basis, I'd already be doing it. As-is I only go to gold when I want to speed up money gain, and even that doesn't always work since gold games have a much higher failure rate than silver ones.

I've actually gotten to the point where I can do gold randoms, and have a reasonable chance (75-80%) of success, without farming tricks like FB White back in the day. It took awhile to get there but all you really need are practice and consumable capacity upgrades (because sometimes 1 medigel or 1 rocket is all that stands between 40000 credits and 70000.)

So it's definitely possible. you just have to stick to it. I know from our ME2 conversations that you're at my level difficulty-wise, it's just a matter of finding the right class for your playstyle and getting the consumables needed to make it through. I know you like Human Engineer for instance - I tore up a gold match with one, coming in first on Jade.

Originally Posted by The Giant

But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Beowulf DW

As for the NCO to officer thing: it's possible, but it's very rare.

As for the special forces thing: My cousin (a marine) told me that sometimes during training you'll be taken aside and asked if you'd be OK with not seeing your family for 5 years. According to him, that sets off special forces training. The training is rigorous and the tests (physical and mental) tend to be incredibly demanding. As in "you'll wish you were dead," demanding. As far as I can tell, it takes a certain degree of extraordinary natural ability and uncommon devotion to one's nation to get into the special forces. My cousin also mentioned that most special forces guys tend to act very humble and low key, mostly out of the need to shield themselves with obscurity.

Oh, I know. Advancement in the military is an internal journey. It's not about training you so much as weeding out the chafe who don't have it in ten before they get hurt. And my understanding of special forces blokes is biased; that's why I'm asking for info.

Shepard was elite special forces, top of the heap. But so was Anderson. And possibly the Big Dude from ME3. The only thing they have in common is that they went on covert missions. Is that the defining characteristic of special forces operatives? Shepard gives the impression of working loosely with the command structure, but that's more being a Spectre than being an SFO.

Special forces in modern American parlance is a guy who gets to do action-adventure style missions. That can't be correct (or at least not the whole story), it's just an easy word to throw onto something so the author doesn't need to worry about actual military command structure. Which leves me up a creek as far as wanting to know how it actually works.

Shepard I can buy being in the top 1/7th o the special forces. Anderson too, even, considering that he was one of the first to receive such training and designation, and because he's a closet Bad 'orse. But beefy squad member? Noooot so much. Which may be why he failed the N7 trials now that I think about it.

Zevox: consider a counterintuitive caster. Try Turian soldier, with concussive shot, proxy mine and incendiary ammo. You'll get just as many bursts, stronger ones even, have more general health and increase damage from all sources to a target by 20%, including primer, detonator, burst, DoT, and carrying fire. Concussive shr tears banshees and collectors to bits, proxy mine damages everything, able to drop a platinum hunter or pyro in 1.7 uses, and was the difference in perspective between gold being hard and platinum being like a tough silver match.

I just ran through a platinum match as a vorcha soldier, a terrible idea. We got to wave nine and croaked, because two of the guys who agreed to our strategy took wide liberty with it and broke class/power usage/movement/priority/role implementation. And we still pulle up to nine by virtue of just two guys coordinating. I'm frequently out of medigel, so that's not what keeps me alive. I rely on flamer, so it's not the weapons or powers. I don't melee, and my regen was pretty crap. It's coordination. You're not goin to die coordination without a mic below gold. Especially not with people playing bad class/weapon/level ominous for challenge points.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

So I'm going to be trying Sentinel next, and it's my first in a long time. Which should I stat up first?

EDIT: So yeah, the Promotion mechanics are completely borked for me. It gives me the extra N7 points, it resets the class, it does everything except actually remove the character from my roster. I think I've promoted my Destroyer like 3 times now, and he's still the same guy. Just, y'know, lv. 1 instead of lv. 20.

Last edited by Landis963; 2012-10-23 at 08:56 PM.

Originally Posted by Zap Dynamic

I want to create a world that is full of possibility, and one of the best ways to handle it is by creating a bunch of stories that haven't yet been finished.

Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c

At this point, however, I'm thinking way too hard about the practical problems of running a battle royale school for Russian assassins, so I think I'll leave it there.

In my posts, smilies generally correspond to my expression at the time. As an example, means "huh?" and "Hmm..". Also, "Landis" is fine.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Landis963

So I'm going to be trying Sentinel next, and it's my first in a long time. Which should I stat up first?

EDIT: So yeah, the Promotion mechanics are completely borked for me. It gives me the extra N7 points, it resets the class, it does everything except actually remove the character from my roster. I think I've promoted my Destroyer like 3 times now, and he's still the same guy. Just, y'know, lv. 1 instead of lv. 20

No that is an intentional part of the most recent game patch. You keep the weapons and appearance sets. Honestly, if the appearances and stuff bother you just change them.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by SiuiS

No that is an intentional part of the most recent game patch. You keep the weapons and appearance sets. Honestly, if the appearances and stuff bother you just change them.

So it isn't a bug that Tyler Arden the N7 Destroyer Soldier has gotten to lv. 20 three times now, been promoted, and yet remains deployed as a lv. 1? The weapons I understand, it would be ridiculous if you lost whatever loadout you had on a specific char when you promoted it, but it breaks immersion that I'm leveling the same guy over and over again. Besides, it feels like I have too many irons in the fire when I have too many chars in the same class (I currently have, for example, 3 infiltrators, two Human (one's a Shadow), one Salarian, all currently blinking that stupid levelup arrow when I promoted them, and I was hoping they'd all go away at once) and I feel discouraged from branching out into different chars when I have so many at once. Why would I, I've got two biotic chars, one weapons char, and no less than 6 tech chars (the three infiltrators and three Engies to go along with them)? I understand that it's weird to complain about this - I don't need to think up new character names this way, among other things - But I'd rather not have to go through every single char I have in a class every time I level it up.

Originally Posted by Zap Dynamic

I want to create a world that is full of possibility, and one of the best ways to handle it is by creating a bunch of stories that haven't yet been finished.

Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c

At this point, however, I'm thinking way too hard about the practical problems of running a battle royale school for Russian assassins, so I think I'll leave it there.

In my posts, smilies generally correspond to my expression at the time. As an example, means "huh?" and "Hmm..". Also, "Landis" is fine.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Psyren

I disagree, walls suck. Walls mean escape routes getting cut off, which means Banshee grabs, Phantom stabs, teammates unable to reach/revive you, less directions to run when a grenade lands in your hack zone etc. In London, sure you can be attacked from more directions, but you can also run in more directions and not get hemmed in/synched by something with a massive hitbox. And I don't remember all the hack zones in Goddess, but the ones I do are on lower ground, making it easy for grenades to end up in your pocket.

Without walls, running is pointless, because you'll get just get shot to death as you do it. You need somewhere at least temporarily safe to run to, with solid objects between you and the things trying to kill you, which you don't really have much of on London, but have a fair amount of on Goddess, with the several side-rooms and outdoor area.

Plus if you're doing a king-of-the-hill objective, running is counter-productive, since it will just cause you to lose. You either hold the location you're told to - with missiles if need be - or you may as well just give up and die.

Originally Posted by Psyren

As for Ravagers - kill on sight. Don't wait until their friends are in your face and forcing you out of cover, pick them off from as far away as you can and ignore everything that isn't a Banshee until you do. Use everything short of a missile to do so - go all out. It should be cake to do so on Silver, and that's another reason I like wide open maps - you can see them coming a mile away and deal with them accordingly.

Yeah, that's not going to work out when you've got Banshees and Brutes barreling down on you, now is it? Especially when your first sign that you have a Ravager to deal with is their missiles impacting with your rear, as is all too often the case on London.

Originally Posted by Psyren

So it's definitely possible. you just have to stick to it. I know from our ME2 conversations that you're at my level difficulty-wise, it's just a matter of finding the right class for your playstyle and getting the consumables needed to make it through. I know you like Human Engineer for instance - I tore up a gold match with one, coming in first on Jade.

If you're suggesting that you need to just stick to one or two classes to play on gold, that's all the more reason for me not to. This isn't like in a fighting game, where I can pick out my favorite character(s) and just keep playing them exclusively because there's always more things to learn to do with them. Lacking that kind of depth to the combat, I need to keep changing classes to keep enjoying it. I mean, just with what I've got now, I alternate between:

And there's still the Geth Engineer, three N7 classes (all but the Destroyer), and a good number of classes released or to be released from the most recent DLC (the Volus, Krogan Shaman, and pretty much everything else from the above four class categories) that I'm interested in.

Edit: I'm starting to think that the developers went a little overboard with how many Dragoons they send at you in the extraction waves. I just had a game where my team got swarmed by about a half dozen of the things in rapid succession. That in addition to the usual troopers lumbering about, including Atlases. We took them down with about as little trouble as possible (two of the team were using Harriers, which somehow seem not to have been nerfed since I last played, and I was doing fairly well against them as my Turian Sentinel with Warp and my Phaeston with damage and piercing mods), but it got very chaotic there for a minute, and had we been in a more exposed position we could've been in a lot of trouble. And this on silver.

Zevox

Last edited by Zevox; 2012-10-24 at 01:02 AM.

Toph Pony avatar by Dirtytabs. Thanks!

"When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up." -C.S. Lewis

"We each decide our own sense of right and wrong. The rest, I leave to my sword." - Yuri Lowell, Tales of Vesperia

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Landis963

So it isn't a bug that Tyler Arden the N7 Destroyer Soldier has gotten to lv. 20 three times now, been promoted, and yet remains deployed as a lv. 1? The weapons I understand, it would be ridiculous if you lost whatever loadout you had on a specific char when you promoted it, but it breaks immersion that I'm leveling the same guy over and over again. Besides, it feels like I have too many irons in the fire when I have too many chars in the same class (I currently have, for example, 3 infiltrators, two Human (one's a Shadow), one Salarian, all currently blinking that stupid levelup arrow when I promoted them, and I was hoping they'd all go away at once) and I feel discouraged from branching out into different chars when I have so many at once. Why would I, I've got two biotic chars, one weapons char, and no less than 6 tech chars (the three infiltrators and three Engies to go along with them)? I understand that it's weird to complain about this - I don't need to think up new character names this way, among other things - But I'd rather not have to go through every single char I have in a class every time I level it up.

But it doesn't break immersion that you hold 100% victory in all sectors of the galaxy in a match you cannot win?

It streamlines things. You now have your character ready to go again when you promote him.

And honestly? I play every character except there'll. They all handle differently and the human male/female split is perfect or trying out variety builds, such as different nova structures. I'm never bored or worrie about having to spread myself out. Each one not only has different strengths but different synergies. Mass effect multiplayer is a team game after all.

Originally Posted by Zevox

Without walls, running is pointless, because you'll get just get shot to death as you do it. You need somewhere at least temporarily safe to run to, with solid objects between you and the things trying to kill you, which you don't really have much of on London, but have a fair amount of on Goddess, with the several side-rooms and outdoor area.

Plus if you're doing a king-of-the-hill objective, running is counter-productive, since it will just cause you to lose. You either hold the location you're told to - with missiles if need be - or you may as well just give up and die.

That's probably why you die. If you have five minutes to achieve an objectiv which lasts 60 seconds, and you get swamped, run away. Draw all the enemies to another corner of the map. It's the same mistake you make by having your vanguard zip around the map; ire, you don't feel like you're "wasting time" but the objective finishes almost exponentially faster with all four of you there. Use your resources; space and predictable enemies. They will follow; draw them away. Cerberus can't target through smoke; hide in it. Cannibals will cannibalize; shoot their rearmost ally and watch them flock. The menu knows you're downloading. Don't give them what they want.

Yeah, that's not going to work out when you've got Banshees and Brutes barreling down on you, now is it? Especially when your first sign that you have a Ravager to deal with is their missiles impacting with your rear, as is all too often the case on London.

I don't know where you're sitting on london, as we are usually covered down in the middle. The trouble spot is right off the left most stairs from the top, and then it's a simple matter f taking cover and not standing there like a target. If you sit an look one direction, even with brutes and banshees barreling down on you, then yes you will be flanked. So spin. Survey your surroundings. Observe your team-mates. Use area powers. Figure out safe geometry. You know toucan shoot through a corner at the edge of an enemy and they can't target you effectively when you do? Without cover. Just standing there.

You've already said you don't do things like pull husks at other enemies and then detonate them. That is tacitly not eliminating one Enemy and damaging another, in favor of just damage. Things like that add up. Every orthodox detonation is one more cannibal who lives long enough to take a shot a you.

If you're suggesting that you need to just stick to one or two classes to play on gold, that's all the more reason for me not to. This isn't like in a fighting game, where I can pick out my favorite character(s) and just keep playing them exclusively because there's always more things to learn to do with them. Lacking that kind of depth to the combat, I need to keep changing classes to keep enjoying it. I mean, just with what I've got now, I alternate between:

And there's still the Geth Engineer, three N7 classes (all but the Destroyer), and a good number of classes released or to be released from the most recent DLC (the Volus, Krogan Shaman, and pretty much everything else from the above four class categories) that I'm interested in.

Not at all. I still switch freely. It's about being flexible, not rigid. Gold Is about fighting smarter, not harder.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by SiuiS

actually, had some stuff worth asking you about there.

On the rank structure, I know as much as wiki would tell you about most militaries (the Aotrs being the exception, obviously, but we are fairly non-standard there anyway). Among my studies of military history, army structure had not been a strong part; mostly I read about what they do, why they do it and what they use to do it, rather than what promotion means what...!

On the second, my uncle used to drink with a guy who I think was ex-SAS, who had a few tales to tell. My uncle said he was a nice enough chap, but there was definately a feeling you wouldn't want to get on his bad side.

'Course, real special forces don't really work like you see in computer games; a lot of their job is recon, by which I mean "go to this place and sit in this spot for several days without moving and watch to see where all the supply trucks are going1." The whole "surgical strike/sabotage" combat missions thing is by far the exception to their missions, rather than the rule.

1Everybody fights basically down roads and transport networks. "Cross-country" just doesn't happen in the real world.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Zevox

Without walls, running is pointless, because you'll get just get shot to death as you do it. You need somewhere at least temporarily safe to run to, with solid objects between you and the things trying to kill you, which you don't really have much of on London, but have a fair amount of on Goddess, with the several side-rooms and outdoor area.

Plus if you're doing a king-of-the-hill objective, running is counter-productive, since it will just cause you to lose. You either hold the location you're told to - with missiles if need be - or you may as well just give up and die.

As Sius said, that's probably why you're dying. Which I find even more odd because you like Vanguards so much - they're the best suited to lead enemies away from the hill, especially on Silver.

Trust me when I say you have plenty of time to get out of the circle for awhile in a hairy situation, and trust me when I say that sometimes that's the best option. You can still easily finish the hack once the heat is off.

Now, if it's wave 10, I fully advocate holding position and using all your rockets instead, but it's not like you have anything to lose at that point.

Originally Posted by Zevox

Yeah, that's not going to work out when you've got Banshees and Brutes barreling down on you, now is it? Especially when your first sign that you have a Ravager to deal with is their missiles impacting with your rear, as is all too often the case on London.

How long does it take you to drop a Ravager? It's 2-3 cooldowns for me on Gold And usually they spawn in pairs, so you can take them out with the same biotic/fire/cryo explosion, and all their bug-babies too. (Though maybe that's a gold thing.)

And as I pointed out, that's a strength of London - you can see everything coming a mile off, but there's still plenty of cover.

Originally Posted by Zevox

If you're suggesting that you need to just stick to one or two classes to play on gold, that's all the more reason for me not to.

Not at all - I'm suggesting you stick to one or two classes to get the hang of Gold, then go back to playing whatever you like once you have a feel for it.

There was a time when I couldn't go near gold with any of the starter Human classes - now they are among my best picks, because I got the hang of universal tactics like watching my six and hitting my ops pack with more forgiving classes like Krogans, Infiltrators and N7s.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

If you sit an look one direction, even with brutes and banshees barreling down on you, then yes you will be flanked. So spin. Survey your surroundings. Observe your team-mates. Use area powers. Figure out safe geometry. You know toucan shoot through a corner at the edge of an enemy and they can't target you effectively when you do? Without cover. Just standing there.
...
Not at all. I still switch freely. It's about being flexible, not rigid. Gold Is about fighting smarter, not harder.

This is probably the best advice I could give. Gold is about paying attention to what your team is doing, knowing when to cover them, and above all knowing when to break away and reposition (and which direction to run in when you do.)

There was a time when I thought it was all about tricks/exploits and farming, and I didn't find that playstyle fun, so I avoided it. Now I know that's just what bad players do to earn gold money. The ones that are capable of queuing up for a totally random gold match and succeeding are both much more fun to play with, and much more common.

Originally Posted by The Giant

But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

On Gold last night on the Canadian map (can't think of it's name- the one where you're scrambling over rooftops) I was playing as the original Asari Adept.

They must have tweaked her because her dodge ability is faster than I remember! I was dodging charging brutes and poison-biotic-balls from Banshees like it was nothing.

It also felt like her powers must have been tweaked upwards as well because her self-chained biotic explosions could knock half the health off of a brute with one explosion.

I found this out because the 2 Random players on the map were basically useless and my friend and I were generally either the only ones working together or the only ones alive. This meant that a lot of the time I would be working alone on one side of the map while his Salarian Infiltrator would cover me from a distance and handle his own AOR. Despite the useless teammates, it was one of the best games I have had in a while

Well, those Hunter changes are very welcome (fire less often and less quickly, and get staggered more often). The drell and turian buffs are odd, but I'm not going to complain. Those Devastator Mode and Supply Pylon nerfs are pretty notable, though. But in all fairness, Destroyers and Demolishers have tended to do extremely well.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

I has a sad about Demolisher nerfs. But it just means I'll have to rely on my Harrier/Widow a bit more.Brute buffs are expected, they're way too squishy for their size (on Gold anyway, not sure about Plat.)

Glad for the Prime nerfs, comboing them was a pain because of the constant drone spawns in between.

VERY glad for the Hunter nerfs, they did way too much damage. Now nerf Scions!

Originally Posted by The Giant

But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

I'm not worrie about the primes myself. Their drones were more seek and destroy recently and often left the prime behind. Once you started combo-ing one they were a nonissue. I'm glad about the spawn time change because I frequently ended up trying to solo the last prime, who was actually the last prime and his three machine gun friends.

Missile launcher is a staple for me. The rocket is a workhorse, scattering swarms of enemies, finishing off a guy during an unfortunate reload, preventing that marauder from successfully stunning me with a punch (yes, it happens) and even setting off fire bursts from my incendiary ammo. It's nice to just falls things and self-combo with no effort.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Resounding meh from me. I still believe AF's strength is being able to run circles around foes raining combos on them all the while with machine-gun-Throw. I'm willing to bet my Fury kicks the pants off any Valkyries I end up in a game with.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Give up frags? Nah. I just divvy up the passive and fitness skills.

This is how I specced my Destroyer too. They don't get enough durability for full Fitness to make a difference even without the rockets, so I ended up not caring what my shields were and going with as much offense as possible. Though with the nerfs I think I'll stop playing it entirely, I was barely able to handle it as it was.

Originally Posted by The Giant

But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by SiuiS

That's probably why you die. If you have five minutes to achieve an objectiv which lasts 60 seconds, and you get swamped, run away. Draw all the enemies to another corner of the map. It's the same mistake you make by having your vanguard zip around the map; ire, you don't feel like you're "wasting time" but the objective finishes almost exponentially faster with all four of you there. Use your resources; space and predictable enemies. They will follow; draw them away. Cerberus can't target through smoke; hide in it. Cannibals will cannibalize; shoot their rearmost ally and watch them flock. The menu knows you're downloading. Don't give them what they want.

Yeah, that would only work if your allies have the same idea at the same time. Otherwise you're just denying them much-needed support, and may quickly find yourself on you own because of that.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

I don't know where you're sitting on london, as we are usually covered down in the middle. The trouble spot is right off the left most stairs from the top, and then it's a simple matter f taking cover and not standing there like a target. If you sit an look one direction, even with brutes and banshees barreling down on you, then yes you will be flanked. So spin. Survey your surroundings. Observe your team-mates. Use area powers. Figure out safe geometry. You know toucan shoot through a corner at the edge of an enemy and they can't target you effectively when you do? Without cover. Just standing there.

Your directions there are contradictory. Cover in London is far too limited to protect you from all directions at once, so you can't both stay in cover and keep spinning to engage things from all directions.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

You've already said you don't do things like pull husks at other enemies and then detonate them. That is tacitly not eliminating one Enemy and damaging another, in favor of just damage. Things like that add up. Every orthodox detonation is one more cannibal who lives long enough to take a shot a you.

I only use one class that has pull, the Asari Justicar, and as I said previously it's the one I play most rarely. And really, detonations? On husks? They're not worth the time it takes to set one up. I just hit them with throw, or incinerate, or shockwave, or simple gunfire, or whatever else is convenient. The only class I'd use a detonation on them with is the Quarian Engineer, because Cryo Blast's cooldown is so short that I may as well use Cryo Blast -> Incinerate on everything that doesn't have shields.

Originally Posted by Psyren

As Sius said, that's probably why you're dying. Which I find even more odd because you like Vanguards so much - they're the best suited to lead enemies away from the hill, especially on Silver.

Oddly enough, I don't think I've ever gotten London when playing a Vanguard. I get it a lot when playing my Human Adept, though, and she's uniquely poorly suited to it, what with Shockwave's limited range.

Originally Posted by Psyren

How long does it take you to drop a Ravager? It's 2-3 cooldowns for me on Gold And usually they spawn in pairs, so you can take them out with the same biotic/fire/cryo explosion, and all their bug-babies too. (Though maybe that's a gold thing.)

Depends on the class, and I've never kept close track. 3 cooldowns is plenty of time for a Brute or Banshee to be in your face, or the Cannibals and Marauders on the other side of you to drop your shields, however.

Originally Posted by Psyren

And as I pointed out, that's a strength of London - you can see everything coming a mile off, but there's still plenty of cover.

Er, what? London has plenty of low cover that will protect you from one direction, sure, but with nothing better that doesn't do you much good, since there's plenty of ways for you to get flanked, and you usually will. And of course, Brutes, Banshees, and grenades will force you out of that cover to boot.

Re: today's patch - First the Krogan Shaman, now the Asari Valkyrie? They're really trying to make me use the new DLC when buying my packs. Those are about the two I was most eager for. Now I don't know whether to switch to the new one or Earth (where I have 3 N7 classes yet to pick up) once I get my Geth Engineer. Kinda surprised that the Asari Valkyrie was one of the more requested characters though - I'd have figured something like the Drell Infiltrator or Geth Soldier would be, not a Sentinel.

Turian Sentinel getting more power damage from his passive should be nice too. And the Cryo Blast buff, for my favorite Engineer.

Zevox

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"When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up." -C.S. Lewis

"We each decide our own sense of right and wrong. The rest, I leave to my sword." - Yuri Lowell, Tales of Vesperia

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Psyren

This is how I specced my Destroyer too. They don't get enough durability for full Fitness to make a difference even without the rockets, so I ended up not caring what my shields were and going with as much offense as possible. Though with the nerfs I think I'll stop playing it entirely, I was barely able to handle it as it was.

You just need (pardon the expression) enuff dakka to make it worth your while. I was lucky enough to unlock a Typhoon and that was my destroyer's go-to weapon for a while. Now that I've unlocked the Typhoon use accomplishment I might switch to the Revenant, I don't know.

Originally Posted by Zap Dynamic

I want to create a world that is full of possibility, and one of the best ways to handle it is by creating a bunch of stories that haven't yet been finished.

Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c

At this point, however, I'm thinking way too hard about the practical problems of running a battle royale school for Russian assassins, so I think I'll leave it there.

In my posts, smilies generally correspond to my expression at the time. As an example, means "huh?" and "Hmm..". Also, "Landis" is fine.

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Originally Posted by Psyren

Resounding meh from me. I still believe AF's strength is being able to run circles around foes raining combos on them all the while with machine-gun-Throw. I'm willing to bet my Fury kicks the pants off any Valkyries I end up in a game with.

Different ideas behind the classes, actually. I wouldn't compete in the same arena. Warp reduces armor DR, increases damage taken from all sources by a lot. Tech armor boosts damage by 30%, and annihilation field, when spec'd for it, heals you when it hits. An Asari can deal damage in an area comparable to a boric explosion just by standing there and using heavy melee. Much less range support though.

On both classes one could entirely forego N7 training/Asari Justicar training, since you rely on bursts. Personally, I enjoy melee AF fury the most, making the Valkyrie competable for my attentions, and allowing me to focus on a single spec for the fury instead of varying it. I am disappointed to find the Valkyrie has the same model as the standard though, and that their passive is named Asari Valkyrie but is identical to the standard.

Originally Posted by Zevox

Yeah, that would only work if your allies have the same idea at the same time. Otherwise you're just denying them much-needed support, and may quickly find yourself on you own because of that.

Sure, sit there and die with your team instead of winning. But if they get murdered and you lea the enemy on a merry chase, you can clear the wave and being them back. As Psyren said, understand how to support your allies, and also when to bail on them. Sometimes reviving that Krogan is a bad idea.

Your directions there are contradictory. Cover in London is far too limited to protect you from all directions at once, so you can't both stay in cover and keep spinning to engage things from all directions.

You can pivot in cover 360° without losing cover. Even when you look opposite from it. That way you are smaller, possible to miss due to intervening cover you aren't rubbing on, and not getting shot from the new back. You're looking at it too literally.

I only use one class that has pull, the Asari Justicar, and as I said previously it's the one I play most rarely. And really, detonations? On husks? They're not worth the time it takes to set one up. I just hit them with throw, or incinerate, or shockwave, or simple gunfire, or whatever else is convenient. The only class I'd use a detonation on them with is the Quarian Engineer, because Cryo Blast's cooldown is so short that I may as well use Cryo Blast -> Incinerate on everything that doesn't have shields.

You're being purposefully silly now. What better, explosion which causes 100% damage, or explosion which causes 175% damage? You are limiting yourself artificially because an enemy, your only goal, isn't worth your time. Especially since the comparison is actually 0% explosion damage versus 175%. And marauders, hunters, troopers, cannibals, centurions, nemeses, husks, abominations, assault troopers, captains all can be used to deal almost double damage to a more powerful enemy while limiting fire from the opposition.

Adapt.

Er, what? London has plenty of low cover that will protect you from one direction, sure, but with nothing better that doesn't do you much good, since there's plenty of ways for you to get flanked, and you usually will. And of course, Brutes, Banshees, and grenades will force you out of that cover to boot.

Only if everyone focuses in the same direction. You've got four guys and 3 avenues of entry. One dude should specifically watch the area. It's cake to keep yourself from being swarmed. Just much harder in silver, which doesn't punish cowboy antics as much. You can't complain about people running off, doing their own thing and losing in the difficulty which encourages running ff and doing your own thing while insisting on running off and doing your own thing.

[auote]Re: today's patch - First the Krogan Shaman, now the Asari Valkyrie? They're really trying to make me use the new DLC when buying my packs. Those are about the two I was most eager for. Now I don't know whether to switch to the new one or Earth (where I have 3 N7 classes yet to pick up) once I get my Geth Engineer. Kinda surprised that the Asari Valkyrie was one of the more requested characters though - I'd have figured something like the Drell Infiltrator or Geth Soldier would be, not a Sentinel.[/quote]

Annihilation field plus tech armor has some obvious synergy. Krogan shaman is also pretty sick for close range damage. Even without warp's unsung expose evolution boosting Krogan melee, shockwave is a good softener for a smack and the 65% BE effect means its often worth it to team up with another priming biotic. It's particularly fun to chase around the fury and launch them, save them from surprise phantomings and such. The divide also lets me use barrier on my Krogan vanguard for power instead of shield recharge, for those times charging is No Bueno.

Incidentally, barrier, fitness, Justicar sphere, and some gear can get your recharge so low it's almost instant. With the shaman this means I can tank while lobbing powers. It's everything I've ever dreamed of...

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Well now, saw something I very much so like today. Incinerate -> Warp = Fire Combo. Two powers that are individually good anti-armor abilities, now creating the second strongest combo in the game together on top of that. Suddenly Engineers and Adepts (and the Turian Sentinel) make much better partners than they ever did before.

Anyway, three more Premium packs. Still no Geth Engineer, and no Geth Plasma SMG either sadly. However, I got my final rank in the Striker, making it my first maxed-out rare weapon. I do believe my Demolisher will be seeing some play tomorrow.

Other than that, the only real notable acquisition was a rank for my Claymore, which is up to 8 now. I had forgotten it was up that high. I might need to check whether it's becoming a viable weapon for my Krogan Vanguard.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Sure, sit there and die with your team instead of winning. But if they get murdered and you lea the enemy on a merry chase, you can clear the wave and being them back.

Right, because I'm going to clear an entire wave that overwhelmed my whole team, in enough time to get back to the hack point and complete it with only one person uploading, on London. Unless it's wave 3 (in which case we likely won't get overwhelmed anyway), not gonna happen.

Just soloing part of a wave that far into a match is a challenge on much better maps (unless you happen to be playing a Krogan Vanguard, and even they have their limits). In an objective wave where enemies will infinitely respawn until the objective is completed, and where my ability to complete the objective is substantially reduced if my allies get killed? No, not possible.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

You can pivot in cover 360° without losing cover. Even when you look opposite from it. That way you are smaller, possible to miss due to intervening cover you aren't rubbing on, and not getting shot from the new back. You're looking at it too literally.

And if my finger on the stick moves even slightly, I pop out of the cover and need to get back into it and turn around again, all while getting shot. Not much help, that. Plus there's the things that does to your camera angles...

Originally Posted by SiuiS

You're being purposefully silly now.

No, I'm being honest. Better to quickly dispatch Husks when needed and otherwise focus on bigger threats - i.e. everything else - than waste time priming a detonation on them which likely won't hit anything else besides maybe other Husks because the Husk will be busy running at me while I'm waiting for my cooldown to finish (which is another reason Cryo Blast -> Incinerate is the only one I'd bother with on them, since the former both stops them cold wherever they are and has a ridiculously short cooldown).

Edit: Also, unless I'm the only one fighting that group of enemies, there's a decent chance of one of my allies gunning down any mooks I try to detonate while I'm setting it up. I learned that much way back when I was still working with the base Human classes, and it hasn't changed in all that time.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Only if everyone focuses in the same direction. You've got four guys and 3 avenues of entry.

3? Only if you're fortunate enough to be in that room at the base of the central stairway, which, while still bad, is by far the best hack point on London. With the other ones you're basically open on all sides.

Zevox

Last edited by Zevox; 2012-10-24 at 11:23 PM.

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"When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up." -C.S. Lewis

"We each decide our own sense of right and wrong. The rest, I leave to my sword." - Yuri Lowell, Tales of Vesperia

Re: Mass Effect 3.7: "That was for Thane"

Sorry, Zevox, but you're wrong. I see people do all these 'impossible' things all the time. I had a big expository post, but it felt too confrontational.

You don't have to advance, you don't have to get better. But don't insist these things can't be done and, by extension, I'm a liar because you can't do them.

^This

I often run London on Gold with no issues at all. This is even when I'm the only sane person taking advantage of higher ground while my party borks around in the kill zone. As long as I watch my corners and stay near cover, then I'm fine.

I don't mind the center hack zone because, while it is challenging, there is still a lot of cover around that can be taken advantage of. Good use of that area depends more on having a good team that is willing to hunker down and watch their own AOR, plus an ability to jump between cover as the tactical situation changes.

In short: London isn't that bad to me. There are other maps I find to be far more annoying.